from the welcome-to-section-301 dept

Well this is interesting. Switzerland, which has been a party to the ACTA negotiations, but last we checked had not signed on yet, has put out a report from its executive branch, basically completely downplaying the issue of file sharing. The report notes, accurately, that consumers are still spending just as much on entertainment, and lots of it are going to artists. The only real problem seems to be a for a few big foreign gatekeepers who are getting cut out of the new revenue streams... and as far as the Swiss government is concerned, those companies should just learn to adapt. It specifically says that concerns about file sharing having a "negative impact on the Swiss cultural creativity are unfounded."

The report also rejects ideas like a three strikes plan or any sort of internet filtering. Three strikes is rejected for interfering with free speech rights, while filtering goes against privacy rules and might also degrade overall internet performance. Perhaps most interesting, the report rejects an idea for compulsory licensing -- something that has been gaining some support, but is a really bad idea. The Swiss report notes that existing media levies are incredibly unpopular with voters who know that the money isn't really going to artists, and separately they fear that it would get in the way of "international treaty obligations." I wonder if ACTA is a part of what they mean there.

Either way, you have to wonder if this stance means that Switzerland just bought itself a place on the US government's ridiculous Special 301 Report, which is basically the US government putting countries on a "naughty list," for infringement if enough rightsholders complain.

Reader Comments

Somebody Finally Got It RIGHT!

Cudos to the Swiss executive branch. The whole idea of legislating or litigating protection for the media conglomerates is ridiculous. If technology is making them unnecessary, they need to change, FAST! They don't, they lose. Hopefully sooner than later.

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Switzerland was once a fiscal paradise that has changed in recent years it is risky to put money there, instead people are opting for fiscal paradises like the Bahamas or Caribbeans just like the Pirates from the movie.

Operation: In Our Sites

We at the ICE would like to announce that we have seized all websites controlled by the Swiss government for their stance on the illegal distribution of copyrighted works. They are costing American rights holders billions of dollars each year with this decision, and it will not be tolerated.

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Hey there,

So, let's stay on topic. The issue here is digital piracy and infringement. Your wikipedia link is lovely, and luckily as a musician I've enjoyed playing Montreux Jazz Fest twice is the past 5 years and toured extensively through the nation. I've played in Zurich, Geneva, Montreux, Biel Bien, Basel, Thun, and a few other lovely areas.

My experience? Switzerland is a wealthy, beautiful and a mostly boring country. That said, their cultural output of copyrighted media that could be infringed or pirated is a pittance, and their political views and legal judgements reflect that.

To even attempt to extrapolate a theory based their decision is cute, but a bit silly considering their media output, GDP and wealth distribution don't you think?

Re: Denigrating Swiss Intellectual Property

Yep, same thing happened when talking about the Swedes and others - "oh, they don't have the same glorious output as the almighty US so their contribution is irrelevant". It's just another distracting technique, along the lines of the "if you're not an artist your opinion is irrelevant" crap that gets spouted here by those avoiding the points.

Switzerland was a "safe haven" for Nazi gold, too.

That's a fact, as is that its banking system is safe haven for money from anywhere, no questions asked. It puts up a facade of "libertarian" privacy while actually enabling criminals of all sorts (particularly national intelligence agencies) to hide money transfers. Switzerland makes ignorance such a national virtue that it even prohibits private investigation of piracy:

"There's nothing quite like the blissful safe-haven feel to Switzerland is there? Last year, the Federal Court ruled tracking companies were not allowed to log IP addresses of file-sharers, making it virtually impossible to prosecute the casual P2P user."

(Knew you'd be compelled to post this, Mike, so saved the link from YESTERDAY.)

Re: Switzerland was a "safe haven" for Nazi gold, too.

Wow - you are on a tear today aren't you?

First, nice use of Godwin's Law though it has no relevance to this topic OR the current state of Swiss policy -> +1

Number 2: Due to extreme pressure over the last decade UNDER AT LEAST TWO DIFFERENT PRESIDENTS FROM OPPOSING POLITICAL BASES, the Swiss have been closing down the secret bank accounts and report banking activity to the US Government regarding US citizen accounts that have caused most of the haven shoppers to take their business elsewhere.

Please do a little more studying before you try putting your foot in your mouth...at least the taste of the previous "meal" will not be as strong on the tongue...

Re: Re: Re: Switzerland was a "safe haven" for Nazi gold, too.

At some point when the pushing goes too far, the pushed, pushes back - hard. Just be happy that the push-back is with something as innocuous as copyright infringement and not something else.

In the case of banking havens, the Swiss finally recognized and acknowledged the errors of their ways to a great extent, even if not very loudly (loud would not be Swiss).

The issue here is that they took a look and quite reasonably saw the overreach, the political points they could gain with their citizens at showing a backbone after having their moral fiber widely questioned, and the realization of what this issue actually is - a power grab by the Entertainment industry at the expense of all other industries because they are trying to use the law to stifle competition and innovation due to a lack vision and ability to adapt.

Don't be so certain that their new backbone will not stiffen further with more pushing...

Re: Re: Re: Re: Switzerland was a "safe haven" for Nazi gold, too.

No one is pushing anyone, what they are requesting is enforcement of existing laws. It isn't legal to copy and share music with your friend. It never was. The entertainment industry generally overlooks this type of infringement and subsequent theft of service, but the scale of infringement involved in P2P file sharing networks was unpredecented and necessitated action. What is wrong with someone expecting to be paid for a service that is used? If you don't want to pay for music, don't listen or find someone willing to pay for you to listen to music (commercial sponsored licensing - Spotify, radio, etc..)

The US Congress, at least this time around isn't attempting a direct extraterrirorial application of American laws. All SOPA wants to do is break the DNS system and deny funding to infringing sites in reaction to a private demand with no due process within the United States.

I suspect the American courts will deal with that bit of silliness in due course.

The only major flaw, well fatal really, is that the recording industry did not offer a service similar to Napster when it got going so there was no service to sell in respect of people wanting singles from CD's rather than 11 or 12 bad songs -- they wanted the good one. (Another failure in customer service.) So people shared, even at dead slow dialup speeds.

And a recording isn't a service it's a product. Folks like lawyers, dentist, veteranarians and doctors provide a service. The recording industry sells a product.

A product, such as the CDs has no intrinsic or real value if no one wants it. Such as the crappy CDs of the day that brought about Napster and it's copycats.

Now as to willing to pay, generally after "trying it out" people are. But you don't seem to believe that so there's no point in kicking you in the general direction of studies that say that cause you're mind is about as open as a rusty steel trap.

But. please, please learn the difference between a service and a product. That kind of simple confusion is only going to convince me you're blue.

Which begs the question of why you didn't bother to log in or is it that DH said something about weird sex to you again?

Re: Re: Re: Switzerland was a "safe haven" for Nazi gold, too.

Re: Switzerland was a "safe haven" for Nazi gold, too.

It's not really "no questions asked". If you transfer too much to your Swiss account, the bank will ask you where the money comes from and you can tell them what you want, just like they can refuse the transfer if you tell them "oh it's just from some bribes I got".
-> banking secrecy only makes sure the government can't just snoop into your savings. Instead it's your bank's job, just like a true libertarian country should do (I'm looking at you United States...).

For the record though the US has asked for records about its citizens who have opened a bank account in Switzerland. That means there's a box to check if you are from the US when you want to open an account in any Swiss bank. If you check that, your application goes directly to the shredder.
Truly the march of progress...

Technical question

OK. So tfa says that in Switzerland it is legal to pirate for personal use. So if I have a Swiss computer, then use that computer to download a song, then that song is owned by me, legally in Switzerland, right? So what then if I transfer said song from my Swiss computer to my American computer? Is it still legal? I'm allowed to move songs I legally own between my own computers, right?

Re: Technical question

What you mean is: It's legal to _DOWNLOAD_ for personal use. Of course it is. It's actually just about legal everywhere on planet earth (or at least, it was until a few years ago; it might have changed in your jursidiction).

It's absolutely NOT LEGAL to MAKE PUBLIC any work for which you do not have the necessary rights.

But it doesn't matter between which of your computers you transfer your files -- all it matters is that you do not offer them to the public.

You know how the record companies will "adapt"? By signing fewer artists, especially those artists from Switzerland. Some of you will applaud this initially as a win, but as the diversity of new music begins to wane you will see the results of this decision. There are alot of people that wont be able to afford to record music because there wont be a label fronting the money.

Like it or not the labels actually do help unknown acts record music and get that music to the masses. Musicians are given advances that allow them to "quit their day job" and concentrate on music - that wont happen without the labels. Removing the record labels will actually harm the diversity of new acts that are able to record music.

Congratulations Switzerland, you have created a new home for the pirate industry. Unfortunately, our cultural heritage will suffer.

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Nevermind the notion that most artists have adapted where labels have not... No, we're going to just believe that copying should be banned because labels make no money from people hearing songs and buying other products that an artist does have cantrol over.

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If an artist wants to give their music away and they own the rights to the music, more power to them. But if the rights holer chooses to market the music it is their legal and moral right to determine how the music is distributed.

Personally, I would like all artists to give away their music, then I wouldn't have to spend any money. I don't go to concerts and I won't buy t-shirts, posters, or anything else they market, I'm interested in the recorded music (and I will pay for the music if they charge me for it, but not the extra junk).

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"...it is their...moral right to determine how the music is distributed."

This is so adorable. You actually thing you can control the flow of information. So cute.

"Personally, I would like all artists to give away their music, then I wouldn't have to spend any money. I don't go to concerts and I won't buy t-shirts, posters, or anything else they market, I'm interested in the recorded music (and I will pay for the music if they charge me for it, but not the extra junk)."

Soooo...you have ZERO interest in supporting the artists? It seems that all you want is free music. Unfortunately for you, there is a small risk in obtaining free music if you get caught (i.e., paying a fine). Perhaps you were already caught once? That would certainly explain your bizarre logic.

You come across as a frustrated pirate. Maybe you should move to Switzerland?

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No, I don't pirate music. I love music, but I don't feel morally obligated to pay for something I don't want. I want music, I WILL pay for music and I have spent a lot of money on music over the years. If a musician offers their music for free (and owns the rights to that music), I will gladly accept that gift from them. I will not feel obligated to purchase something from them that I have no insterest in.

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You avoided the comparison because you know the number of musicians who got rich without record companies can be counted on your fingers. By "gatekeeper" do you mean rights holder? Technology did not contribute to recording companies being the rights holders. Contracts signed by two consenting parties contributed to record companies becoming the rights holders to the music.

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You avoided the comparison because you know the number of musicians who got rich without record companies can be counted on your fingers.

No, I avoid the comparison because it's meaningless. When the automobile was first developed, you would have been there going "This will never work! Compare the number of people employed in making horde-drawn carriages to the number of people making cars and . . ."

By "gatekeeper" do you mean rights holder?

No, I mean gatekeeper. In the past, the kind of capital required to produce and edit quality recordings and distribute them across the globe was way, WAY out of the league of your average musician, and hence they had to go through gatekeepers to get exposure.

How much does it cost today to edit music on your home computer and upload it to the internet? Yeah.

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You avoided the comparison because you know the number of musicians who got rich without record companies can be counted on your fingers.

No - we avoided the comparison because musicians becoming rich is not a positive. Musicians earning an adequate living and producing good music is a better comparison - and there are far more of those now than ever before.

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Technology did not contribute to recording companies being the rights holders.

Are you really so stupid that you don't see this point? Or are you being willfully stupid.

To me it is blatantly obvious that the structure of contracts is determined by the balance of power between the parties - and the balance of power is determined in the short term by mopney - but in the long term by techmnology.

How on earth do you not understand that.

What do you think would have happened if the first recording/copying device invented had been the personal mp3 recorder?

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The banking system doesn't affect the ordinary Swiss people directly and so no-one bothered to set up a referendum. In any case if you look at the details of the deal you will find it doesn't go quite as far as you think.

If the Swiss government proposed "caving to pressures from the US" it would trigger a referendum and get voted down.

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The UBS banking disclosure is the only one that I'm aware of and UBS got a lot of heat for it.

Further, the whistleblower in the US got a lot of persecution for what he did. So unless you have something I'm missing, I doubt one bank's disclosure really says much about the rest of the banking structure.

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Criminals no longer hide their money in Swiss bank accounts because Swiss banks now disclose banking transactions requested through subpeona. This is something that changed due to pressure from other governments, primarly the United States.

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You know how the record companies will "adapt"? By signing fewer artists, especially those artists from Switzerland.

Um. Like they sign many artists from Switzerland today?

Some of you will applaud this initially as a win, but as the diversity of new music begins to wane you will see the results of this decision.

That makes absolutely no sense. The big record labels have never been about diversity of new music. They've been about the reverse, because their whole model was based on lowest common denominator huge hits, backed with tons of marketing.

The diversity in music you see today mainly comes from indie artists, finding their own niche online.

Your claims don't pass the laugh test.

Like it or not the labels actually do help unknown acts record music and get that music to the masses.

Which Swiss musician has the major labels brought to the masses?

Congratulations Switzerland, you have created a new home for the pirate industry. Unfortunately, our cultural heritage will suffer.

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How many undiscovered musicians can afford the expenses of a recording session? I know a lot of musicians who simply can't afford professional recording equipment or even the expense of renting studio time. Even after recording the music there is the expense of mastering (mixing the tracks, adjusting equalization, etc..). Who will pay for these expenses if not the record labels? I know about alternate funding methods like Kickstarter, but people don't want to donate to an unproven artist.

Labels are good for getting started, they become a hindrance for artist after they have established themselves.

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Oh look he's recording two synths and a drum machine. Try recording actual drums, horns, accoustic strings, etc... The prices for multitrack recorders start in the hundreds of dollars and reach to tens of thousands. That isn't counting eqs, mixers, mics, pickups, cabling, etc... Even a rudimentary home studio with minimal accoustical dampening would set you back thousands of dollars. You might be happy with the homebrewed garage sound but I'm not.

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So what I'm getting from your arguments the more I read is that you and the only musicians you think are worth anything care more about the quality of their recording equipment and how much money they can make than they do about the music.

A friend of mine is in a band and they do all their own recording and editing and it sounds great, because their music is great.

I would figure this is obvious, but I'll say it anyway, music is about music. If technology brings an end to the multimillionaire musician and multimillionaire producers I don't really care. As long as there are musicians who care about music there will always be diversity. And they may not be super rich, but they will be able to make a living. That should be enough to anyone who actually cares about their art and expression. For everyone who doesn't make music because they can't make enough money to have private jets and 30 room mansions with private movie theaters, they weren't worth the millions they would have made.

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"I would figure this is obvious, but I'll say it anyway, music is about music. If technology brings an end to the multimillionaire musician and multimillionaire producers I don't really care. As long as there are musicians who care about music there will always be diversity. And they may not be super rich, but they will be able to make a living. That should be enough to anyone who actually cares about their art and expression. For everyone who doesn't make music because they can't make enough money to have private jets and 30 room mansions with private movie theaters, they weren't worth the millions they would have made."

I'm saying this in reply to what you said but more aimed at the AC you replied to. There's a band called Clutch. Amazing band. Huge, but not Lady Gaga huge (obviously). They have a great outlook. This isn't an exact quote, but their view on music is simple and is as follows: "As long as we make enough money to pay the bills, are able to keep touring and playing in front of our fans and keep recording kickass albums then we'll keep doing what we're doing. We may not be huge, but we don't need to be. We do it because we love what we're doing."

I'd personally rather there be more Clutch like bands in the world than over produced and over played radio friendly hits and bands. That's just me though. If you haven't heard of the band, check 'em out. From Beale St. To Oblivion is an amazing album. "Electric Worry" being one of the stand out tracks.

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That is the beauty of having a choice, isn't it? You have a choice to enjoy their music, eventhough the majority of the world would prefer to listen to Lady Gaga or Justin Beiber.

I am the original AC and my point was that record companies aren't keeping artists from being successful, an accusation someone else made. I refuted that claim by pointing out that there are many artists who are multi-millionaires because of the record companies.

Personally I don't care whether someone chooses to sign with a label or not. The general attitude on this site is that of complete contempt for the labels. and in many cases the scorn is unjustified. Yes, some labels have cheated some artists out of money. But labels have also created careers for people who never would have been successful otherwise.

Vilify the labels for what they do wrong, but don't blame them for defending their legal rights (as copyright holders) and requesting stronger tools for the enforcement of existing copyright laws. Basically my understanding of the new laws that SOPA will create do two things: (1)force payment providers and ad placement services to stop sending money or ads to sites accused of infringement. (2)Force DNS providers to redirect traffic away from sites accused of infringement.

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Also your understanding of the real world is lacking:

(1)force payment providers and ad placement services to stop sending money or ads to sites accused of infringement, creates a fertile environment for abuse and corruption. (2)Force DNS providers to redirect traffic away from sites accused of infringement, puts everybody in risk, not to mention the also fertile environment for abuse and corruption.

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Guess what? Most new artists don't want or need "professional" big label production or ridiculously expensive big-name studio time. All of the serious artists and bands I know either produce their own stuff or get it done at a low-cost indie recording studio.

You know why this is possible? DAW software. You just don't need $100,000 worth of recording equipment to produce a decent sounding record anymore.

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you know how the record companies will "adapt"? By signing fewer artists

That's not "adapting", that would be "accelerating their own demise."

Record companies make money by selling records. If they sign fewer artists, they'll (by definition) have fewer records to sell. If they keep their same business model, but just "sign fewer artists", they'll just hasten their own irrelevance.

as the diversity of new music begins to wane you will see the results of this decision

Fail. Your argument assumes that the only way for diversity to increase is through recording companies. This is not just provably false, but proven false. Recording companies are responsible for the most homogenous, inane pablum that exists. Diversity comes from independent artists, who are not pressured to make their music sound exactly like every other band.

Removing the record labels will actually harm the diversity of new acts that are able to record music.

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

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"created a new home for the pirate industry."

By keeping the Status Quo? You fucking nitwits expanded Copyright to kingdom-come the last few decades, and exported every thumbscrew-measure to the rest of the world, and now you're accusing a state that is just keeping tha status quo of "creating a new home for the pirate industry."?

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I am not sure that a country that forces all of their male citzens into becoming part of a militia is all that "civilized".

It is when they are a neutral, and land isolated country with traditionally hostile nations on all their borders. This is no different than what the Israelis must do to protect their small nation and under the circumstances, it is a highly civilized way to address a pressing need. It is also cost effective as they do not need to keep a large, expensive, and cumbersome military on hand in case of hostilities.

Did you know it is illegal to hang laundry, wash your car, or mow your lawn on a Sunday in Switzerland?

What is uncivilized about laws that are designed to respect the comforts and rights of neighbors? Think of these as no different than your local Home Owners Assiciations and we all know how uncivilized the suberbs are here in the US...

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You are the first person I have EVER heard actually defend HOAs. The funny thing is you aren't just defending them you are presenting them as a bastion of civility in opposition to the general consensus which is that they are an affront to personal property rights.

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The general consensus of Libertarians, not the entire American population. And if you don't like them, they can very easily be avoided - just don't move to or purchase property in or near an HOA.

I am not saying I like them any more than others who do not like them, just that they are a derivative of civilized behavior which has at its core some restrictions on what people can or cannot do based on contract or agreement.

This too is civilized behavior whereas anarchy might be preferential to some, it is far from being civilized when you look at it this way...

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There's stupid laws on the books in every civilized country. Most of them made sense at the time, then fell into disuse and forgotten. I highly doubt anyone's actually going to jail for washing their car on Sunday.

Regarding conscription, plenty of other European countries do it to and the US keeps every male on their "you may be conscripted if we feel like it" list. None of these conscripts actually serve outside of Switzerland and the militia only exists to ensure all Swiss citizens know how to defend their country if invaded.

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Swiss Laws

For the record: Yes, I'm swiss.

And this page about swiss laws is total bogus. About half of those "laws" are regulations pertaining to habitants of very specific appartment buildings (presumably the authors). Some of them (like the one regarding absinthe or mowing your garden on sunday) were revoked something like 20 years ago.

Small wonder the issue is downplayed in Switzerland given the comment in the linked article that "piracy is only a significant concern for 'large foreign production companies'". Perhaps if it had "Geneva-wood" as a part of its economy it might view the matter differently.

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I think a false dichotomy is developing here regarding regarding quality and cost of recording. It's not like most musicians are either a 16 year old with a microphone and garage band on his computer *or* guns'n'roses "Chinese democracy " with two years in the studio and full orchestral arrangements. Most productions fall in the middle. A few thousand dollars to set up a home studio is quite reasonable for a serious amateur musician, and many will record the bulk of their project at home but rent studio time for a few sections. Quality of the results has more to do with talent than type of recording setup. Also, remember that traditionally most big labels spend far more on marketing than production.

But what I really want to ask is a hypothetical question: should the strength of copyright be related to how much the property cost to produce? Perhaps we need some sort of graded system .

Re: NO... JUST FLAT OUT HELL NO

The only thing any type of 'graded system' would do is further the divide between the 'haves' and 'have nots'. The system is already designed in favor of the gatekeepers, what you are suggesting is that those with more funds should be able to 'buy' better rights than those without funds.

And before you start talking about the 'studio cost of production', they really didn't need to pay the Executive's nephew 5 million to tell his friends on facebook about the coming movie (charged to production costs as 'viral marketing'), but they did, and just because they did it doesn't mean that they are entitled to more protection.

Take it back to a register to receive the copyright for 10 years, with increasing fees to extend it in 5 year increments, and it might be closer to a 'fair' system. Giving those with money the power to buy more rights just because they can waste more money than a reasonable person would when making a movie doesn't mean they should be rewarded for it.

If someone pays $10 million to make a great movie, does that make it any less deserving of full copyright protection than a studio producing a cookie cutter comic book regurgitation/remake for $300 million? Wolverine? Captain America? Thor? I'm not saying they aren't great stories, but they are no original, and just because the studios spent lots of money producing a public domain work doesn't mean they are entitle to any more protection than the little guy who's producing original content...

Lets add in that Switzerland is a democracy with definate socialist leanings, encouraging a culture of sharing. A culture many of us would like to see spread to our own countries. And don't artists, like all citizens of Switzerland, live pretty well there?